Nick and Craig: ah, that nickname comes from when I was about 12. That's when hiphop and rap were starting to make its way into more mainstream culture and so we gave each other nicknames. He was G-Rod and I was T-Funk.

Travis was actually first called T-Rex, given his abnormally short arms and large head. That changed when his homies found out his ability to slide through sticky situations. His name was then changed to T-Fal. After following the singer / rapper T-Boz for many years, lamenting that he was 'just not her type,' he changed his name to T-Funk hoping to spur a love connection.

"I thought that a nickname is given to you. You have no choice in the matter. Maybe that's why there's no response"

You thought wrong. When you create an account, you choose a username and password (your username is what Travis is calling his nickname). Your choice. While there is a mechanism to change your billing name and address on your own (which is the name that shows in front of your username), there is no mechanism, it seems, to change your username on your own.